It’s just ten minutes a day and it has already had an amazing impact.

For the last two months, our family has implemented ten minutes a day of quality time between each parent and each of our children. This is a first and most important tip in Amy McCready’s book The “Me, Me, Me” Epidemic: A Step-by-Step Guide to Raising Capable, Grateful Kids in an Over-Entitled World.  In her book, McCready calls this “Mind, Body and Soul Time.”

McCready explains that this ten minutes a day of Mind, Body and Soul Time is important to provide your children with two primary emotional needs: belonging and significance. So spending this time with each child every day reinforces both that they matter and that they belong.

This time also has additional benefits:

1. It regularly fills up your child with positive attention, which deepens your connection with them; and
2. It reduces difficult behaviours that manifest when children aren’t feeling like they’re getting the time and attention they need.

Intrigued? Well, this is how it works…

The rules that McCready outlines for this 10 minutes of Mind, Body and Soul Time are simple:

• Your child gets to choose the activity.
• The time is spent one-on-one with the child uninterrupted.
• You, as the parent, give the child your undivided time and attention.
• You set a timer to make sure both of you know when the ten minutes ends.
• And most importantly: no screens allowed!

In her book, McCready emphasizes that just implementing this one tip will have an amazing transformative impact on both your children and your relationship with them. She also asked that parents “suspend disbelief” and just try it to see how it works.

So my husband Robby and I suspended disbelief and gave it a try. We have now been spending 10 minutes a day with each child for two months and it is already proving to be well worth it.

Have You Ever Heard of Sticky Ball?

Through the ten minutes a day, both of our kids have invented new games for us to play. Currently, our family favourite is called “Sticky Ball.” For this game, the kids cut out paper in different shapes and taped them to our front window. Then each person throws the suction cup ball at the window trying to score points:

• sticking it to the window is 1 point;
• sticking it to the window frame is 3 points; and
• sticking it inside the cut out targets is 5 points.

Both my daughter and son have created variations of the game, which include cards to score points with, extra long distance throws for bonus points, and a volleyball spiking sticky ball challenge. To top it off, we have also invented two Sticky Ball Dances (Fortnite-style) – we think they might go viral!

Now you might be thinking: “wow that is a lot of detail about the made-up game called Sticky Ball.” And you’re right… but I included that whole description to emphasize how the 10 minutes a day has provided a space for creativity, connection, laughter and fun for our family. It has also created opportunities for very memorable and exciting moments like those end-of-the-game buzzer shots when one of us hits the target to win the game just as the timer goes off (and the crowd goes wild!). This had led to moments of whooping, cheering and celebration that we wouldn’t otherwise have without those ten minutes a day.

Sticky ball is just one of many examples of the ten minute activities that deepens our connections with our children and reinforces their significance. The kids have also invented a Nerf Dart shooting challenge, new card games and drawing challenges. We play board games, play outside, and go for walks together.

Benefits of Setting Aside Just Ten Minutes a Day with Each Child

After just two months, I can already report some powerful benefits to spending ten minutes a day with each child.

 1. It has increased the laughter in our family.

The ten minutes a day has significantly increased the amount of laughing that our family does together. I want to pause here because just a couple of years ago I remember thinking: “I used to laugh a lot but now I hardly laugh at all.” As parents, we can get so caught up in all the things we have to get done that we forget to stop, pay attention, and enjoy the time we have with our kids. So laughing together is a really important benefit for all of us as a family.

2. It has increased physical activity and learning.

It has also created opportunities for activities that challenge us physically and mentally. For the kids, the card games have helped them practice their math skills and we can see a noticeable improvement in how fast they can add things up. Other games of strategy have helped them develop their critical, strategic skills. 

For all of us, it has created opportunities to be more active after dinner – whether we’re running around throwing and retrieving sticky ball or going for a walk outside.

3. It has helped us reflect on the quality of time we spend with our children.

Implementing ten minutes a day has provided both Robby and I with the opportunity to reflect on the quality of time we spent with the kids before implementing Mind, Body and Soul Time.

For me, on homework days, my after-dinner time with the kids often involved trying to keep them on task to finish their homework. It was time spent full of frustration for me where I would consistently try to draw on a deep well of patience. After implementing the ten minutes a day, the focus of this after-dinner time has shifted from nagging the kids about their homework to spending quality time together before asking them to do their homework.

And you know what?

Getting them to do their homework after the ten minutes with each of us is much easier. I bet McCready would say that it’s easier for them to just sit down and get their homework done since their buckets are already full from spending quality time with each parent.

For Robby, the ten minutes changed his whole night since he’s always very busy getting things done. If I had to describe his parenting style it would be that he parents like it’s an extreme sport – he’s all in, works hard and is really fast at getting through his to-do list. So implementing the ten minutes a day was a real change in pace for him after dinner. Instead of tackling all of his to-dos, he stops and spends quality time with each of our children. And he has really relaxed into the ten minutes a day and looks forward to the time with the kids (especially if it is to play Sticky Ball!).

4. It has created a set time each day for us to connect with each child.

In our family we have other moments, namely dinnertime, that we spend as a family connecting about what has happened in our day so the ten minutes a day provides an opportunity for one-on-one connection time with each child. Before implementing it, I was deeply aware that I was spending less time with my older child. So this ten minutes each day provides a set amount of time for my son and I just to hang out together, chat and enjoy each other’s company. And although the amount of time I spend with each child isn’t completely even, both of us appreciate having uninterrupted time together each day to connect and enjoy each other’s company.

5. It has provided opportunities to help our children develop important life skills.

The ten minutes a day has provided opportunities for us to support our children to develop important life skills. One example is that this time has helped my daughter develop more confidence in her abilities. One day she chose to play chess against me, which she knows her older brother is good at. She had watched us play and, at times, had played on my team against her brother but had never played on her own.

It was her first game of chess so I gave her some tips at the beginning but then I let her play the rest of the game out by herself. She ended up winning and her face lit up like the sun. It was a great, confidence boosting experience because it provided her with a safe space to try something she had never tried before and to figure it out. We have played several times since at her request and, although she hasn’t always won, she definitely has confidence in playing chess now.

This time has also created an opportunity to have conversations about being a gracious winner and a gracious loser. These skills are so important to talk through so that the kids can practice before they go out into the world because we can all agree that nobody likes a gloating winner or a sore loser.

Suspend Disbelief and Test It Out Yourself

I‘m all about testing things to figure out if they really work. So Robby and I suspended our disbelief and tested out spending ten minutes a day of quality time with each of our children.  To our delight, we have found that setting aside 10 minutes a day to spend with each of child has been one of the best things we have ever done.

It’s such a simple idea: spend just ten minutes a day with each child and give them your undivided attention.

Make daily connection with your children a priority. It’s a simple idea with profound rewards.

So will you give a try? With just ten minutes a day, you just might be blown away by how much you and your children get out this precious time together.

We would love to hear your thoughts in the comments below. And after you implement ten minutes a day, please come back and tell us how it goes, we can’t wait to hear all about it!

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